Owls still not in top gear....

Article by Lee Jenkins

After last season's surprise heroics making it to the playoff final at Wembley, only to be beaten comfortably by Hull, expectation levels this season amongst Sheffield Wednesday fans have risen quite considerably. With the summer additions of players like Steven Fletcher, David Jones and Almen Abdi all from current Premier league clubs, many fans including myself would agree that we appear to have a stronger squad than in previous years. A squad which has depth and is able to cope with the relentless task of Saturday Tuesday games week in week out. With 2016 over and Sheffield Wednesday finishing the year in the final playoff spot, you would expect Owls fans to be feeling optimistic for 2017. Could this be our year??

At a glance our last 5 results have been solid if not spectacular. If given the opportunity I would have taken 11 points from a possible 15 through the difficult christmas period, picking up 3 wins and 2 draws. Our three wins coming in two local derbies against Barnsley & Rotherham then a massive game away at Newcastle, three games all won without conceding a goal. The impressive Boxing day performance live on Sky against Newcastle will live long in the memory of many a Wednesdayite. A game which showed both our attacking threat and our ability to see out a game when under enormous pressure from the promotion favourites. A performance that I've believed we were capable of producing however so far this season hasn't materialised all too often.

Unfortunately the performance at Newcastle has only managed to create more frustration for me as an Owl's supporter. What Loovens headed goal did was mask what were two very average performances against Barnsley & Rotherham at Hillsborough. In the game against Barnsley we were fortunate not to be a couple of goals behind at the break. Tom Bradshaw and Sam Winnal guilty of missing a couple of clear cut opportunities. A fortuitous own goal giving Owls the lead early in the second half helped to give us the platform to score the second goal and see out the game. A converted injury time Fletcher penalty was enough to secure all three points against Rotherham and although we dominated possession we were not convincing to say the least.

Two games in 48 hours either side of New Year's day would pose even more uneasy feelings for me. You could argue that good teams find ways to win when they aren't playing well, which we have been doing of late and also that it's a plus for us to pick up a point in the last minute of the game against Preston. I would normally agree but our poor performance when picking up a point in the game at home to Wolves shows worrying signs for us. We lacked a cutting edge going forward despite the debut of Callum Mcmanaman who joined the club for West Bromwich Albion in the week. Forestieri who had been sidelined against Preston, returned to action but looked sloppy in possesion and appeared to be really short on fitness.It was Westwood who seemed to be the busier keeper first half and despite over 30,000 Wednesdayite's in attendance there was a subdued atmosphere around the stadium. At half time Carlos was forced into a change with Kieran Lee unable to play any further part in the game. He has subsequently had an operation to fix a long term hip issue which could rule him out for 3/4 months. With Lee's departure we lost our driving force from central midfield. His replacement Wallace playing in his familiar right wing role meant Bannan moved alongside Hutchinson and Bannan quickly began orchestrating our play. Vincent Sasso partnered Lees in central defence, despite never having a real run in the team he still feels for me a squad player at best and there is real danger that a long term injury to Lees or Loovens would leave us vulnerable in this position. He was guilty of giving the ball away on too many occasions and looked nervous when the ball was played over his head.

For all that was disappointing in the game there were still some good performances. In Westwood we have the best Championship goalkeeper and if it wasn't for his brilliant shot stopping ability we could easily be 10 points worse off this season. Sam Hutchinson back in his more familiar role at the heart of our midfield is currently playing at the top of his game. Seemingly covering every blade of grass and providing some much needed presence and protection for our back four. In attack the return of Gary Hooper in the coming weeks will give a different option and provide greater goal threat than both Nuhiu and Joao. With the January transfer window now open there's still the opportunity to strengthen more and already the club have been linked with Charlton defender Morgan Fox and the never ending saga that links Jordan Rhodes to the club has resurfaced again. However this deal still seems way off at the minute.

We travel to Middlesbrough this weekend in the 3rd round of the FA cup. Although a fairytale trip to Wembley for a cup final would be great, would i take a good solid performance with a narrow defeat so we can concentrate on our promotion ambitions, You bet i would.